Thoughts on Growing up, 1st Semester

Everyone always talked about how they just "wanna get out of this valley", but I don't think they realized what that meant. I know I didn't. Do I love my life right now and where I'm at? Yes. Of course I do. I have made so many new friends and I am doing well in school. I like being on my own and experiencing new things and things on my own, but here is what we didn't realize.

I was so excited to go to school and be on my own with my best friend in the whole world. I didn't realize I was going to have such a hard time with the squad break up though. 2 of the squad are on LDS missions (so extremely proud of them!), 1 of them is in Logan going to school (also so proud of him!), the other 1 is in the Arkansas at school (also so proud of him!), and our last member is with my best friend and me, but will be leaving us soon (so proud of her as well!)! We were all (and still are) so, so close, and I don't go a day without thinking of something that we all did. It is so hard to just not be with them. I look back on the memories and just laugh like that time I got pulled over driving one of the boys' vehicles without my license (oops haha), or that time we played basketball, or the timeless movie nights and fires.

Everyone thinks it will be amazing to go out on your own and not have to check in with someone every hour or so. You don't have a curfew and everyone thinks that will be amazing. These are both awesome, and I love the freedom, but sometimes I just kinda miss all of it. It is weird to be so used to a routine that you have, and then suddenly you are out on your own and you have to totally reinvent your routine. It is nice to be on your own, and it is fun! Sometimes you just miss it though. Sometimes, you just miss your family.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoy being an adult and I enjoy being on my own, but it is HARD! There are so many different adjustments that you have to give yourself time to adjust to. You have to have patience and learn that things are NOT always going to happen the way you want them to. You just have to deal with it. Have a plan, but know that that plan probably isn't going to work out exactly how you want it to. It is important to be prepared, but it is also important to be flexible. You don't want to rush things that shouldn't be rushed. You don't want to totally break down and become nonfunctional when your plan doesn't work out. College is for you to figure these things out. Find yourself, and explore new things.
Although life is hard, it is so worth it.

Life is always going to throw surprises at you, so you just need to grab life by the reigns and ride it out. It may not always be fun, but in the end, it WILL be worth it. After all, growth is painful, but you won't get anywhere sitting in the same spot and trying not to change at all. The purpose of life is to become the best person we can be, so go be that person. You will never reach your potential if you don't get up and try. Push yourself outside of your comfort zone, make new friends, have emotional breakdowns, but most of all, enjoy life. After all, we only have one chance on this earth, so why not make the best of it?

Love,

MaShayla :)

The Miracle of my Patriarchal Blessing

I have been wanting to talk about patriarchal blessings so bad lately, so I figured, where is a better place to write about it on your blog?
I got my patriarchal blessing in the summer of 2013. I was 14 years old. I had wanted it so, so bad, so I finally made the call and set up with an interview with the bishop. After the interview I made the call to our Stake Patriarch and set up a date and time. I was so thrilled. The day came for me to get it. In preparation I read the scriptures, fasted for as long as I physically could, and then we went. I took my parents with me. I remember the Patriarch explaining to me the process and how it works. I remembered him telling me that if I had a sincere question, to think of the question while I was getting the blessing and it would be answered. The spirit in the room was so strong, I couldn't believe it. I felt so close to my Heavenly Father that night. I did have a couple of questions, so I thought of them and the instant I was thinking them, Heavenly Father allowed them to be answered in my blessing. It was amazing.
The thought that Heavenly Father has a personalized road map outline that will be true if we continue to make the right decisions, warms my heart. It testifies to me of the honest and true love that He has for us. It shows me that He wants us to live with him again, and to do that he gives us something that will help us. Our patriarchal blessings.
I was extremely excited about it 3 years ago, but I am still excited about it. There are so many things that have yet to be fulfilled in it and I am just so excited for the future. I have had a couple of things that I have dealt with, a couple of frustrations, but every time I read my blessing, I feel so inspired and calmed because I know that wonderful things are yet to come. It has given me great comfort throughout these first 2 months of college. It has testified to me that just because things didn't go as I planned, or wanted them to, Heavenly Father has his hand in all things and everything will work out in the end. So, until then, trust in Him and rely on your patriarchal blessing. It is a great guidepost in your life of how to live worthily and the blessings that will come from it.
I am so thankful for my patriarchal blessing. I would be in so much loss and sorrow if it weren't for that amazing blessing that comes directly from our Heavenly Father. I am so blessed to be a part of this gospel and to know that my Heavenly Father loves me, and to know that I am not alone. He is always here for us and it gives me so much comfort. Patriarchal blessings are just a testament of how much he loves us. Every time you read your blessing you feel a sense of peace. The direct words to us are sacred and shouldn't be openly discussed unless prompted by the spirit. I have felt the promptings of when it is ok and not ok to talk about what is in my blessing and you will just be able to tell which is which.
I am so grateful for this church and gospel. I would be so lost without it. I know that patriarchal blessings are directly from out Heavenly Father and will help us in times of despair. I know that when we need help we can pray, search the scriptures, and search our patriarchal blessings and the answers will be brought to us at the right time. Heavenly Father will not leave us comfortless, and I think that he has shown us that through His love and all that he has done for us, including the sacrifice of his only begotten son. I am so thankful for the atonement and the reality of it, and I am so thankful that Jesus Christ was willing to pay for our sins. I would be so lost without this knowledge and so lost without the comfort that this gospel brings. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Love,

MaShayla

What High School Taught Me

High school taught me many things, about myself and about life in general. As I have graduated I have realized that I need to

1. Stop caring about Others' Opinions

Be yourself. If people don't like you for who you are, that's their problem. You don't need to change to make people like you or put on a fake character. You need to be yourself and be happy with who you are. The less you care about what everybody else thinks about you, the happier you will be.

2. Work Hard

You aren't going to just waltz in and be given a diploma. You need to work hard. The harder you work the better it will end up for you in the long run. The harder you work the more you will learn about how important hard work is. When you learn the importance of hard work it will stick with you and you will carry it with you throughout your whole life. In job careers, family affairs, and friendships or other relationships.

3. Don't Be Afraid to Change Plans

My whole life I had said I was going to be a vet and then when Junior year came around I decided I didn't want to go to school for eight more years, I wanted to have a family. That is when I decided on going in to nursing. If you decide your original plan isn't what you want anymore, don't be afraid to change it. You only have one life, so make the best of it and go into something you want.

4. Don't be a Homebody

Get out and do things! Join that club, or that sports team. Don't be afraid to try something new and be a part of something new. The purpose of high school is to make memories and the best way to do that is by joining extracurricular activities involved with the school. You will never know what amazing friendships or other memories you will create by doing this. Go to that school dance, even if nobody asks you to it! Go with a group of friends, just go! Memories are BY FAR, the MOST important part of high school. This applies to life, go out and have fun, but use your brain!

5. Don't Trust Everybody

There are many people who are out there that want to help you, but sometimes the people you thought you could trust are the ones you can't. Just be careful of who you trust and never trust someone spot on.

6. Rely on your Family

They are the only ones who will be there for you 100% of the time. If you need something, go to them. Do NOT be afraid to ask them for the help you need.

7. Be Kind

You never know what battles people are fighting. Be a friend to everybody. Let people come to you with their problems and help them! They might just need a friend and you can be that for them. Be the person they can trust.

8. Be Punctual

When you are expected to be somewhere, get there. If it is important you should be there at least 15 minutes early. I learned this from school and sports practices. If you are late, it is going to affect other people.

9. Let Loose

High school is meant to be one of the funnest times in your life. You can't have fun if you aren't having fun or are being too worried about what everyone else thinks. Let Loose and have fun!

10. BE YOURSELF 

I can not emphasize this enough! Nobody does you better than you. You need to be happy with yourself, so quit caring and be you! The only person that can make you happy is you, and it depends A LOT on your attitude and mindset. If you get up and think "Ok, I'm going to be me and I am going to have a great day!", you are probably going to have a great day. If you wake up with a negative attitude worrying about what everyone else is going to think about you that day, your day is not going to be very good. Be you and love yourself!

Love,

MaShayla

Rules for a Happy Life

Recently, for our Senior Project in English, we had to read a children's book, discover the moral, and write 10 rules about how to achieve this moral in our own lives. I chose the book "Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon" by Patty Lovell. This book is about a young girl who is insecure about herself, and then her Grandma teaches her ways to deal with those insecurities. The moral of this book is to learn to accept and love yourself. The whole reason I am writing this, is because I wanted to tell you the 10 rules that I came up with to live a happy life.

1. Know what you want and go for it. You can’t just expect people to hand you things in life. You have to work for it. When you know what you want that’s the first step to working toward it.
2. Never put others down for their achievements. When someone else does something good in their lives, don’t put them down for it. Be there and be proud of them. Make it make you want to work harder.
3. Never EXPECT anything! You are not here to be given things, you are not here to be lazy and have people wait on you. You are here to work hard and do good.
4. Ignore the negative vibes. Ignore the negative people. Surround yourself with people who want to see you succeed, it will only help you in this life.
5. Show others you can be great, especially when they think you can’t. This is not to be confused with being cocky or arrogant. Just prove to people that when they say negative things, it only makes you want it more.
6. Allow yourself to accept failure. You aren’t always going to succeed. The important thing is that you don’t give up. Use the negative feeling of failure to motivate yourself to get it right the next time.
7. Show your confidence. When you show you are confident people are less likely to say negative things because they know it won’t “press your buttons”. Don’t let small-minded remarks get in the way of you and your goals.
8. Allow others to help you. There will be times in life when you need help, and allowing others to help you will keep you humble. After all, there is a difference between taking pride in yourself and your life, and being prideful.
9. Accept change. Life isn’t always going to stay the same. The sooner we learn to accept and handle change, the easier we will realize we can become successful in situations that aren’t ideal.
10. Be kind. You never know what battle someone is fighting. When you see someone compliment them, say hello, whatever, but never let a personal problem or “problem to be solved, become more important than a person to be loved”. -Thomas S. Monson
    
    
    I believe that by following these rules, you will be happy and be able to enjoy life. :)
    Love,
    MaShayla <3

Realizations and Lessons

People told us it was going to be over quicker than we realized, but we didn't want to believe it. They said "You're going to miss this!", and we knew we would.The worst part is not one of us knew how bad we were going to miss it, or how weird it was going to be to realize it, after your last game at state, the last game you would ever play in. You realized that you would never put that jersey on again. You would never be in the locker room with those same people yelling "TEAM!" before the game. Never again! We realized that we would never cry due to a loss or win with those girls again. We realized that no matter what, we will never get that time back to be with our team just one last time.
What we didn't realize is that we weren't prepared of all of this. We didn't realize that on our last game we would be such a mess because we have so much love for each other and we knew that we would never play together again. What we didn't realize is that although people tried to tell us, we took it for granted and the season went way too fast.
Through all of this, we recognized that we are a team, a family. We did realize that we have so much love for each other and our coaches that nobody could tear us down. We did realize that we are there for each other through thick and thin. We realized that when people are there to talk crap on us and our team, our teammates have our back and we knew that we could do anything or obtain any goal we wanted to.
Our coaches always pushed us to do our best. They push you until you think you can't go anymore and then they push you just a bit more to show you that you can. After that last game, you realize you will never have another game with them. You will never have another practice with them. You realize you took those practices for granted but now, you know you are going to miss them. You know you are going to miss your coaches pushing you and telling you to "push harder", to "dig in", or to "Rise to the occasion." You realize you will never get yelled at on the court again, and it sort of makes your heart want to burst.
When you play your last game ever, not only do you have the emotions of the outcome to deal with, but the emotions of all of the realizations that this time next year, you won't have basketball to look forward to.
Although it is hard to see these realizations fold out in front of you, I think there is one VERY important realization that hits you out of nowhere. The realization that it's over is one thing, and then you realize that there is more to life than sports. After that you get the the biggest realization of all is which is that  there is so much more to sports than sports. You realize that throughout the season, and your high school career you have learned teamwork and how to work with others under pressure. You learn that life doesn't always go your way, but that's ok because it ends up working out. You learn that no matter how hard you try, sometimes you just can't pull it off, or you just can't get what you wanted, but guess what, life goes on and you have to learn to deal with it. You learn how to deal with disappointment in yourself. You learn that you can't alway be perfect. That you are going to make mistakes, And do you know what?! IT'S OK! You don't have to be perfect all the time, even though some of us think we do. We learned how to work with someone when we are not be on the best terms with them. We learn to become passionate about something which in turn teaches us not to give up. But the most important thing that we have learned through our sports career, is that we can do hard things! We can accomplish hard things.
So yes, realizing that you have just played your last game sucks, but what sucks worse, is realizing that now, you don't get to be on a team to learn life skills. You have to do it by yourself. What sucks worse is realizing that you aren't going to get that adrenaline rush right before tip off with all of your teammates standing round you, trusting you. What sucks worse, is realizing that your "family" is going to be torn apart after graduation because you will never play with them again. What sucks worse is that you don't have your coaches to tell you to "just slow down, everything is going to be fine."
Although it sucks, it is so worth it. The pain of realization is so worth these past 9 or 10 years that we have been able to play together, and these past 4 in high school. The pain is so worth knowing that you got to be a part of something so great. The pain is worth being coached by the 3 greatest coaches in the world. The pain of being done, is so worth everything you learn from sports and from each other.
So just a heads up for you underclassmen, don't take it for granted. I know you are going to hear that a lot, but it is so true. Don't take your teammates for granted. Don't take your coaches for granted. And most of all, don't take playing on the court and the life lessons you learn from your sport, for granted. Make sure you know that's it's going to go by fast and make sure you give your all, NO MATTER WHAT!
Thank you to my coaches and teammates for allowing me to realize all of these things and for etting me be a part of something so special. I don't know what I would do if  I hadn't had the opportunity to play sports in high school.
Love,
         MaShayla